T-Mobile’s Jump Plans Purportedly Getting Changes On February 23rd

It looks like T-Mobile is preparing to change their “Jump!” early upgrade program quite a bit. According to TmoNews, “Jump!” will be changing from a timed upgrade to a more payment-styled plan on February 23rd.

Currently, Jump is limited to being able to upgrade your phone every six months instead of whenever you want. So in essence, you are currently being told when to upgrade. But with the new Jump plan, you will be able to upgrade truly whenever you want. You just need to trade in your device.

But before we get to the new plan details, it looks like more devices will work with Jump. Currently, Jump early upgrades are limited to only smartphones. But now tablets will be included as well. So if you buy a Nexus 7 from T-Mobile now and the new one comes out in a few months, you’ll be able to use Jump for your tablet. That’s a nice addition to the plan.

Back to the new plan details themselves. You currently have had to have paid at least half of your device off before upgrading. Since device payments are paid over a 24-month period, that means you had a high likeliness of being unable to use your early upgrade at the 6 month limit expiring.

TmoNews says that customers can upgrade whenever they want by trading in your device. You will receive full credit for all remaining payments on that device, up to half of the phone’s original cost. They aren’t exactly sure what that means, but my speculation is that when you trade in your device, T-Mobile will pay off the rest of your 24-month device fee. But your device will only count towards 50% of your payment plan.

So essentially, if you bought an HTC One right now, that’s $0 down with a monthly fee of $21 for 24 months. The full retail value (as of Friday February 14th) is currently $504. So if you want to upgrade in another month to the new HTC device, you will trade in your existing phone for another one.

But the HTC One itself may only count for half of the full device payment plan, which is $252. So you might have to pay the rest of the phone off yourself. But since that’s not clear yet, we’ll have to wait until February 23rd for the full details.

Current Jump customers will be grandfathered into the old plans, as long as they have had Jump for at least 6 months or more. Looking at these plans right now, I think I’ll stick to my current Jump plans. But for those of you who don’t have Jump yet, how do these new plans sound to you?

Disclaimer

Disclaimer: we are not affiliated with the device manufacturers or phone carriers we mention in any way, all suggestions are based on our own experience and research, you may use our advice at your own discretion.